


rum and coke

by saraheli



Category: Block B
Genre: Angst, M/M, POV Male Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 14:21:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14792144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saraheli/pseuds/saraheli
Summary: Working as a bartender has its ups and downs. Most nights leave nothing with you, but one night opens the door to everything.





	rum and coke

You were the last one working most nights, so you saw all the craziest things any bartender could see. Middle-aged men confessed their deepest secrets to you over glasses of whiskey and college girls asked what time you got off work as they spilled tequila down their sheer tops. But the people you really enjoyed were the regulars: the ones who talked to you like an actual person and asked you about yourself and made your nights a little brighter with their generous tips. Some of the people you were closest with had started out as your regulars.

He had started out as one of your regulars, too.

The evening was as ordinary as ever. It was still early, so only the unemployed or the horrendously heartbroken sat before you. The bar was silent apart from the clinking of ice cubes in glasses and the subtle groans of old men to the waitresses about food and “treating you tonight”. You listened as you worked, doing what you could to ignore everyone, but you couldn’t ignore him when he came in.

His very presence was illuminating.

His smile was brighter than every face in the room, and his voice sweeter than any candy you’d ever tasted. He spoke to everyone with a sparkling charm that made him glisten gold in the room of darkened wood and low spirits. He spoke to you with that charm, too.

He sat in the middle of the bar and he would later reveal to you that he did this so you would have to pass him each time you went from one end to the other.

“Hey,” he grinned at you, “could I have a rum and coke?”

You stopped in front of him, tucking the bar towel into the back pocket of your jeans. “Sure thing. What parts?”

“Half and half,” he replied, sliding his hand through his hair.

“You’ve got it.” You mixed the drink in front of him, sliding it across the bar to him once it was finished. “I haven’t seen you in here before.”

“Yeah, I don’t get a lot of time off these days.” He replied, hissing after taking a drink.

“And you chose to spend your very limited time off in a place like this?” You asked with a chuckle, wiping out the inside of a now clean glass.

He laughed and nodded, “Good choice, huh? I have a feeling the company isn’t as bad as you might think.” He said, his gaze resting on your face for longer than it should. He bit his lip before smiling again, “I’m Kyung, by the way.”

And then everything was different, your whole world new and polished as if Kyung himself had opened up your mind and cleaned it for you. He came back three times a week, and he would later tell you that he was there to see you, only ordering drinks so you would have to wait on him. One of those nights, he would leave you a napkin with his phone number on it and you would call him for the first time in the moments following your shift.

“Hello?”

“You actually left me your number,” you said, slinging your jacket over your shoulder as you walked to your car.

“I did.” He chuckled, “I do tend to do that when I meet a guy I like.”

You didn’t respond for a moment, sitting down in the driver’s seat. “Don’t you think it’s a little presumptuous? How do you know I even return your interest?” You asked, smiling a little to yourself as you started your car.

“I mean, you did call me, didn’t you?”

And you kept calling him. And then phone calls turned into meeting for drinks when he was around and sending messages into the wee hours of the morning when he wasn’t. It turned into something just beyond the boundaries of friendship, lying in the gray area in which you didn’t know what to call him when you introduced him to someone or what to say when you hung up the phone. It didn’t bother you much in the beginning, but then something shifted.

You saw him on television. You saw him online. You heard his voice on the radio and on your phone. He was everywhere and it seemed like everywhere he was, he was with someone else: another guy, one of his friends; or a girl, and the dating rumors would swirl around them like water around a drain. You couldn’t help but wonder if they were true since each time you asked him, he would tell you not to worry about such things, but your suspicions were finally put to rest when he came home again.

“So, what is this?” You asked him, sitting on the couch in his studio as he worked.

“Uh, you’ll have to be more specific,” Kyung said with a laugh, turning around to face you in his chair.

“This…Us.”

“Oh,” Kyung pushed his headphones all the way off, “Well, I kind of thought we were friends.”

“Are we?”

Kyung furrowed his eyebrows at you, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, I mean, I guess I was.” You said, chuckling bitterly and looking back down at your phone.

Kyung stared at you. He pulled his lower lip into his mouth and bit down on it as he studied you. His eyes glazed over your visage, but you didn’t notice him staring until he was already forcing his gaze away.

“You weren’t wrong,” Kyung said, replacing the silence that had fallen between you with his voice.

“You’ll have to be more specific,” you replied, parroting his words from before.

Kyung cleared his throat, “We’re not friends,” he said, his forehead wrinkling as he thought, “but you…all of this? It’s impossible.” He said.

“What are you talking about? If you’re worried about what people will think—”

“God, no, it’s not that,” he said as he met your eyes, “I have no time. As you’ve already experienced, I am never here. I can’t give you something normal. I can’t give you anything that you’re supposed to have, but holy shit I have never in my life felt about someone the way I feel about you,” he said, looking down at his feet, “You…you make me want things I can’t have.”

You were quiet for some time. You let out a long breath before looking over at him again. You had never seen him like this. You two were not usually so vulnerable when you were together and you couldn’t ignore the warm unease that radiated from your chest.

“I don’t think I want something normal, Kyung.” Your voice was just above a whisper with unmatched intensity. “I mean,” you raised your voice to a normal volume, “I’m just a guy you met in a bar, this wasn’t  _supposed_  to be anything.” You met his eyes.

Kyung swallowed. He took his headphones off entirely and stood from his seat, coming over to sit next to you on the couch. He slowly took your hand in his and looked up at your face. His hand came up to brush over your cheek, the line of your jaw, your lips. It was so gentle that you wondered if you had imagined it. He placed his hand on the back of your neck and tenderly pulled you towards him.

You could never have prepared yourself for the way his lips felt. They were soft and slow against yours, but they moved with purpose. He seemed calm, but his heart was racing and his hands were shaking a little as one of them came to rest on your shoulder. You took your lips away from him a bit and looked into his face.

His eyes were half-lidded as he brought himself back to reality and his lips glistened where he proceeded to lick them. His cheeks were a sweet pink and, once he finally met your gaze, his eyes were soft and dark.

“So,” you whispered, your breath dancing in the space between you. “Was that something you thought you couldn’t have?”


End file.
